Sunset
by tsusami
Summary: Ikuto contemplates blurred lines. Amuto, One-shot


Sunset

Sunset

The days were getting shorter. Long shadows stretched across the school yard, amidst the gray and blue of buildings reaching into an orange sky. Ikuto watched his own shadow shifting with each step, one moment a looming giant, the next a smudge of amorphous black. Exiting the gates he waved casually to the few classmates greeting him. He tugged on the strap of his violin case, hugging it tighter and continued to cross the empty street. He walked a block in one direction before he paused, a bicycle bell ringing angrily behind him and a disgruntled rider swerving around his suddenly unmoving form. He stood undisturbed, rooted to the spot considering his options: an empty house devoid of anyone but memories or the easy, warmly lit, populated streets? It was an easy answer.

He retraced his steps to the three way crossing, choosing to take a left to the station instead. That man would be home late as always and Utau would no doubt be performing on Sanjou's latest strings. Only that shell of a woman was there and somehow strangers and lonely rooftops seemed preferable to a virtually empty home. He decided on the park where there would no doubt be musicians and other strays, like himself.

He walked on autopilot, mind not really taking his surroundings into consideration. He meant to go to the station, catching the train to the park a few towns over, but a quick glance up informed him that was not where his feet had chosen to go. The clean white walls of Seiyo Elementary took on a golden hue in the orange setting sun. Children in familiar black coats and red plaid skirts scattered like marbles across the sidewalks and narrow streets. He caught himself looking for one face in particular, shaking himself out of it when he realized what he was doing. This it not where he meant to be. She was not what he was looking for.

He turned around to head in the other direction- away from the gate and the possibility of running into her by chance. That seemed to happen a lot these days, or so he told himself. He felt conscientious of the key swinging from his case, wondering if it perhaps led him to her; wondering if perhaps the lock at her heart somehow detected him too. Easter was getting impatient with his interfering. They did not appreciate him consorting with their competitors. And though he declared himself her enemy on the job, lately it was becoming more difficult. Nikkaido's silence may have protected him from Easter's wrath, but the damage was done, the lines incontrovertibly blurred. No matter which way he justified it, he couldn't deny he sometimes wished for her success though it was his best interests on the line.

"Iiikutooo!" a familiar feline voice sing-songed. "Are you free now? Can we go play?" he said excitedly. Ikuto narrowed his eyes at the playful kitten.

"Where have you been?" he asked. He cleaned the board of earlier thoughts and greeted his companion with a suspicious grin. Yoru's innocent smile was betrayed by a mischievous chuckle.

"Catching secrets da nya!" he said, toothy smile demonstrating his sense of accomplishment.

"Hnn," Ikuto said skeptically. He knew what type of information Yoru considered "secret" and the storage locations for milk and fish weren't exactly deemed valuable. Ikuto paid little heed to Yoru's glee and continued walking. Yoru floated over Ikuto's shoulder and followed him, purple tail swishing excitedly.

"Don't you want to know where Amu is?" Yoru said. Ikuto was annoyed by the fact that Yoru thought this would catch his interest. He ignored the bait, continuing to walk alongside the school wall. "She's in the garden, patrolling," Yoru continued anyways. "Guess who she's with!" he exclaimed. "It's a new guardian," he said delighted.

This caught Ikuto's attention. He was generally uninterested in the guardians, barring Joker and the boy King. But Yoru's excitement over the new guardian suggested someone of import, someone recognizable. "Hnn?" Ikuto raised an eyebrow. "Someone we know?" he asked his small companion.

"Sanjou's little brother da nya!" he replied instantaneously. "They're looking for X eggs," he added. This caught Ikuto by surprise. Surely this was no coincidence. But Sanjou seldom dabbled with plans not involving his sister, leaving Ikuto to wonder what she could possibly be up to.

"Show me," Ikuto said. Yoru responded with a feline grin, speeding up to hop over the gate. Ikuto glanced around cautiously, slipping around the corner off the main street. He leaned against the wall casually, looking like a waiting bystander until he was certain no one would see him. With a single graceful bound he landed atop the fence and quickly leaped down. He landed smoothly on the plush grass, eyes darting through the trees in search of his guide. Yoru rested on a branch a yard away, smiling with barely contained excitement.

"Come on!" he shouted, waving a giant paw and scampering off. Ikuto readjusted the strap of his violin case. He thought about stashing it safely in a tree, but decided against it. He couldn't risk someone stumbling across it accidentally. He held onto it tightly, wading between the dappled orange light shifting with waving leaves. He recognized these grounds, being no stranger to the ins and outs of Seiyo. If they continued left they would hit the planetarium, the domain of the odd first king who constantly invited him with tea and milk and Yoru's favorite snacks. But Yoru wove a semi-straight line towards the garden where the guardians held their meetings. He paused well before they reached the glass dome, ducking behind a tree and gesturing at Ikuto to do the same. Ikuto climbed into the tree as gracefully as possible, settling quietly on a solid branch that hardly shifted under his weight. From this vantage point he could see what Yoru was gesturing at.

The Joker was sitting casually on a tuft of grass, back leaning against the rough bark of the tree. A boy, no doubt younger than she sat stiffly next to her. His tension was apparent next to her cool, unaffected air. Ikuto tried not to laugh. He sat in seiza, back stiff as a board and his shoulders thrown back. His hands rested in his lap when they weren't pushing his slipping glasses back onto his nose. He stared at the floor, but even his long dark bangs couldn't hide the flush of pink on his otherwise pale cheeks.

"Sanjou-kun, do you think the others need any help? Should we go find them?" Amu's voice floated up. "I'm sorry to make you sit here with me, but I'm a little tired from the chara nari. You can go find the others if you like."

So Sanjou's little brother was helping them cure X eggs, not collect them. Ikuto found this terribly interesting. He had caught wind of a scheme involving large amounts of x eggs, but here was Sanjou's brother working against them. Ikuto wondered if perhaps the younger Sanjou was so unlike his sister or if there was more to this than meets the eye. Sanjou seemed startled by the Joker's proposal, fingers clenching in his lap repeatedly before shaking his head.

"You need my help if another one appears. The others are sufficiently paired and capable. Rest until you feel ready to continue. Musashi and the others will retrieve us if our help is needed." His voice sounded more collected than he appeared. Ikuto watched the exchange with interest, amused by the Joker's utter inaffectation next to his. If Sanjou sent this boy in to work against the guardians she was a fool. The Joker's power was more than just the locket around her neck or the three eggs in her possession. Nikkaido was proof of that. If this boy was working against the guardians, the mission was already forfeit. Whether he knew this or not was uncertain, but the nervous fiddling of his fingers and the stiffness of his body, turned away from the no doubt warm presence next to his was proof enough. She, of course, did not see what Ikuto could. Her eyes were full of the boy King and failed to see anyone else.

"There have been so many X eggs lately," she commented thoughtfully. "All for the sake of finding one." The idea seemed sad to her. She sighed with uncharacteristic softness. "Inchou, if you found the embryo, what would you wish for?" She asked it casually, gaze far off in the distance, beyond the line of grass and trees in sight.

The boy paused, pushing his glasses up firmly. He crossed his arms, head tilting in thought. "I have no wish," he stated. "None that I cannot achieve on my own."

"Heee," Amu was impressed. "So Inchou has his cool side too," she teased. He tensed like a cat before making himself settle.

"How," he started, stuttering a little, "how about you?"

Amu touched a finger to her cheek, considering her answer. "There are many things I could wish for," she started, "but none that I'm sure would be valuable enough to need the embryo. There are so many more wishes out there that are much more important than mine." She seemed troubled when she said this and Ikuto wondered if it was the boy king she worried over. He felt a twinge of annoyance that she would be so concerned with someone else's wishes. "I think I too would like to follow Inchou's example. I have many would be selves," she smiled, "but what's the fun of changing myself if it's not through my own effort?"

Ikuto's head rolled back, thudding against the bark. _Change through one's own effort._ He smirked. _She's such a kid_, he thought envying her naivete. He ignored the pang her words created. Isn't that what they were doing now? Isn't that what this was all about? He felt disturbed by his inability to conclude with a clear answer.

"It's getting late," she commented. Sanjou nodded in agreement. "We should find the others before it gets dark. I think we can call it a day, ne?" she smiled at him with unusual cheer. Ikuto wondered if this was another character mask or if she indeed had learned to smile like that. Sanjou nodded, lowering his face to hide what Ikuto suspected was another blush. Ikuto resisted the urge to show himself, to sneak up on her and startle her out of that relaxed state and perhaps dispel the odd mood her words had created. The trickster in him delighted in the startled reaction, the lapse in character that left her bare of her usual masks. He wanted to fluster her simply because he knew he could and feel that ounce of satisfaction he experienced each time she grew flustered, an yelled at him in an honest knee-jerk reaction. But Sanjou's brother was a risk and he would not reveal himself when he could not discern whose side the quiet boy was playing for.

He watched silently, cat ears flexing to catch the slightest sound. His purple tail curled at his side. He watched her rise to her feet tiredly, hand braced against the trunk for support. Something shimmery slipped to the grass unnoticed as she pat her skirt and swiped away clinging blades of grass. "Let's go," she said cheerfully, walking in the direction of the guardian's headquarters. The surprisingly tall boy stood and followed quietly. Ikuto's eyelids fell halfway, watching them disappear through the dimming light. They chatted most of the way, Amu's face occasionally turning to smile or laugh at something one of them said. He envied the easy way in which they talked.

Ikuto watched well after their shadowy outlines disappeared. His head swiveled to search the quiet, noticing that Yoru had disappeared. The impatient kitten had no doubt grown bored by the conversation and sought out more interesting companions. Though he never said so, Yoru was quite fond of playing with the other shugo chara.

Ikuto hopped down from his perch, picking out a small charm from between exposed roots and blades of grass. A flat metal cross rested in his palm, a bent link threaded through a pinhole at the top revealing its method of escape. It looked like the type of charm attached to charm bracelets or other accessories. Ikuto realized she had lost it and considered following her to return it. He looked in the direction she had disappeared tense with indecision. That was the direction of the other guardians, of her adored boy king. As much as he loved unsettling the usually tame boy, he wasn't in the mood.

He closed his palm, unshouldering his violin case and settled against the base of the tree. He would wait here until Yoru returned, here in the spot where she sat just moments ago. He looked into the forest of darkening trees, certain sunset was approaching somewhere behind the walls of Tokyo towers and storied houses. He stretched out his legs, abandoning ideas about lingering in the park, ignoring the way his stomach rumbled and relaxed into the unyielding bark. He closed his eyes, recalling her words, pulling up the reasons he felt they were wrong.

Not all change was through one's own effort. Not everyone could control their own destiny, power lying in the untouchable like the sun or the moon or the hands of adults who had forgotten what it meant to dream. Some changes were not sought, some were unwanted; some wiggled their way into life like a smile from a girl who did not know her own strength.

Ikuto's violin case shifted, sliding from its perch against the tree. The Humpty key jingled against its ring, the silvery chain pulling taut. Ikuto tried not to think about its counterpart. Instead, he stared up at the sky and wondered how long it was until sunset. Here, in his shady nook, he was untouched by the fading orange glow. He saw it on the shadows of the main building, shooting higher than the trees and the dark shadows growing large across the grass. A cool breeze lifted, ruffling his bangs and reminding him of coming autumn. One hand closed tight over the sliver of metal in his hand, he closed his eyes drowsily and felt its warmth.


End file.
